September 9, 2025 • 18 mins
Men, what does it truly mean to be a man? In this episode on the Manhood Tribes Channel, we explore the five marks of manhood: strength, courage, skill, honor, and allegiance.
Don shares his personal journey and the challenges he faced in understanding manhood, leading to the creation of his book 'How to Be a Man.'
Available for pre-order on Amazon now! https://www.amazon.com/How-Be-Man-Masculinity-Brotherhood-ebook/dp/B0FPBPZL97/
This episode not only defines these key traits but also provides actionable steps for men to develop and embody them. Tune in to learn what it takes to live a life of authentic and impactful masculinity.
00:00 Introduction: What Defines a Man?
00:46 The Struggle with Modern Masculinity
02:53 Introducing the Five Marks of Manhood
06:21 Strength
08:32 Courage
10:03 Skill
11:20 Honor and Allegiance
15:36 Conclusion and Call to Action
💪 Want to know how you measure up as a man? Take our free quiz, called How Manly Are You? and learn how you can get better at being a man. Download for free at manhoodtribes.com/manly. 💪
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
Men, if I ask you the question,what is it that makes you a man?
How would you answer thatquestion?
And now I'm not just talkingabout what makes you a man
physically, right?
Not body parts, but I'm talkingabout at the soul level.
What is it that makes you a man?
(00:22):
Would you have an answer to thatquestion?
And even if you did have ananswer to that question, how
confident would you be in that?
Answer that, yeah, that's theright answer.
And not only that, it's theright answer for you, but that
you think it's the right answerfor men in general.
That what it is that makes you aman is what makes other men
(00:43):
believe that they are men aswell.
Now, I know that maybe sounds alittle complicated or a little
complex, but I think actuallythat's the question that we as
men are wrestling with in ourculture today.
It has gotten really difficultto figure out what is a man in
our culture?
How do we males know that we aremen?
(01:07):
How have we lived or what havewe done that has earned the
right for us to be called men?
Is it just simply by having maleanatomy and showing up onto the
scene that we get to be calledmen?
I think most of us feelsomething intuitive in us that
tells us, ah, there's more to itthan that, but we're not
(01:29):
entirely sure what that is.
If any of that rings true foryou, I want you to know that it
rings true for most men.
It certainly has rung true forme and in my early twenties, I
was really wrestling with thesequestions very significantly.
What does it mean to be a man?
(01:50):
Am I a man?
How would I know if I am one?
How do you define what it meansto be a.
All of these questions havegotten really unclear in our
culture, and it from the time ofmy twenties to where I am now in
my forties, it's only gottenmore confusing in our world.
The whole idea of gender and ofmasculinity in particular are
(02:14):
things that have gotten veryvague, have gotten very fluid.
When it comes to masculinity,have maybe even become very
negative to even think aboutidentifying that way or
proclaiming yourself as thatsometimes looked down upon or
frowned on, or made for you tofeel something shameful because
(02:35):
that's how you think ofyourself.
All of that makes it reallydifficult for us as men to
actually figure out what does itmean to be a man and how do we
live as men in a way that feelsboth authentic and helpful to
the world around us.
My name's Don Ross, and here weare on the Manhood Tribes
(02:56):
Channel and I have some reallyexciting news, which is that I
have written a book called Howto Be a Man, and this book is
meant to help us try to answersome of those questions to
together, to be able to give ussomething of a roadmap to
figuring out what does it meanto be a man.
To give us a vision of strongand healthy masculinity and
(03:19):
point us in how to actually beable to get there.
Because I'll tell you what,guys, when I was in my twenties,
I'm wrestling significantly withthose questions.
I was having a hard time findingthe answers.
I didn't know who to turn to.
I didn't really have a model forwhat I wanted to look like as a
man, and so I wasn't sure whatdirection I needed to head in to
(03:41):
be able to actually make thathappen.
So I just started doing what Icould.
I read a bunch of books thatwere written about manhood and
masculinity.
I watched a bunch of movies thatguys really love and tried to
figure out what is, or what arethose movies saying about being
men?
And I just started talking to awhole lot of men.
(04:01):
I asked guys my age and guysolder than me, what it meant to
be a man in their minds.
And I got honestly a lot ofdifferent answers.
But I did start to see somethemes emerge.
I started to see somecommonalities, both from the
ways that guys around me talked,but also in stories and
histories, the ways that guyshad kind of always talked, the
(04:24):
things they talked about, theways they lived, the kinds of
relationships and interactionsthat they had, not only with
just the culture at large, butespecially with other men around
them, the men that they wereclose to, and why they chose to
be close to those men.
What was it about thoserelationships that helped them
be able to step into manhoodwithin their realm and feel
(04:47):
confident that they belonged asmen?
These are the things that I wasreally hungry for and that I
think our culture is hungry foras well.
And what emerged from all ofthat study and research and
question asking and conversationwas what I have now written
about in this book that I callthe Five Marks of Manhood.
(05:08):
Now, if you followed along onthis channel at all, you know
that we talk about the fivemarks of manhood regularly, but
I don't always get to go indepth into the five marks of
manhood in every episode here onthe channel.
And so that's one of the greatthings about this book is that
it gives me an opportunity todiscuss with you what these
marks of manhood really are andwhat they're all about and why
(05:29):
they present to us a picture ofmanhood that is worth following.
So let me very briefly lay outto you what those five marks of
manhood are, and then we'regonna talk a little bit more
about them so that I can giveyou some information that you'll
find.
Uh, some of it's in the book,but not all of it is.
And so I want to tease you to beable to get to a place where you
would say, yeah, I need more ofthat.
(05:53):
The five marks of manhood arestrength, courage, skill.
Honor and allegiance.
These are the traits that Ibelieve every man should possess
in order to demonstrate what itmeans to be a man.
In other words, you should havethose things within yourself so
that you can live them out in away that other people see from
(06:13):
you.
Oh, yeah, that's what it meansto be a man.
He does those things.
Strength, courage, skill, honor,and allegiance.
He does them in a way thatdemonstrates, he is a.
man Now let's take a little bitmore of a deep dive into each of
those things.
Strength.
When I'm talking about strengthas a mark of manhood, I'm
particularly talking aboutphysical strength, although I
(06:36):
know there's other forms ofstrength as well, but.
Physical strength is somethingthat is really at the core of
what it means to be a man.
Our bodies are built forstrength, and there's something
about the essence of a man thatinvolves using our bodies to be
able to do something that weonce couldn't do, to push
(06:56):
ourself to a limit and tosurpass that limit to see how we
are capable of overcomingchallenges in the world by using
our physical strength.
This is at the heart of what itmeans to be a man.
And our physical strength ismeant to be for good.
It's meant to be offered to theworld in a way that helps
others.
Men show up in the world bybeing strong and by using our
(07:20):
strength for the benefit of theworld around us.
This is the essence of whatbeing a man is all about, and
all of the other marks ofmanhood flow out of this idea of
strength.
So that's the perfect place tostart.
It's also the easiest mark ofmanhood to be able to work on.
One of the great things aboutthe marks of manhood is that we
(07:41):
can get better at all of them.
You're not stuck at the placewhere you're starting from today
in any of them, and just becauseyou might feel maybe a little
bit unmanly in a certain area,maybe particularly in the area
of strength, doesn't mean thatyou can't do anything about it.
Are you gonna be the world'sstrongest man one day?
Probably not, but that's notwhat the mark of manhood of
(08:03):
strength is all about.
It's not about being strongerthan other men.
It's about using your strengthfor the benefit of others around
you.
So you've got to be cultivatingthat strength so that you have
something to actually offer andgetting stronger.
Getting better at strength isactually not that hard for men
to do.
Like I said, our bodies arebuilt for it, and so if you can
(08:26):
push yourself just a little bit,your strength will naturally
improve.
The second mark is the mark ofcourage.
Courage isn't about having nofear.
It's about actually showing upin the face of our fears and
trying to move towards thosethings in a way that we can
overcome them.
So courage is really about aposture and a movement.
(08:50):
It's about saying I'm not goingto back down from the things
that scare me, from the thingsthat intimidate me, from the
things that feel maybeoverwhelming or too big of a
challenge.
In fact, I'm going to stand upto those things and figure out
how to move towards them.
And in doing that as a man, Istart to learn that.
(09:10):
I actually can overcome somethings that my courage is meant
to assist me in being able toaccomplish the things in life
that are really worthaccomplishing.
Whether that's actually, uh,facing up to some kind of threat
or something that's imposing orintimidating and being able to
say, Hey, no, you don't get totake advantage of me.
(09:32):
Or whether it's something morelike.
Going into a relational depthwith someone that you want to go
closer with, and realizing youdon't really know what to do
there, but you're gonna ventureinto that territory anyway.
That can feel really scary formost men to do.
But building those kinds ofclose relationships, whether
it's with a woman or whetherit's with close other male
(09:55):
friends, those things are reallyvaluable in a man's life.
So summoning the courage to beable to do that is really
important.
The third mark of manhood isskill.
Skill is really all aboutlearning to be able to do things
well.
That can be simple things like,you know, driving a car or
fixing a leaky faucet, or it canbe much more complex.
(10:17):
Things like running, learninghow to run an organization, or
how to be able to cure some kindof illness or disease.
Those things all involve skilland men are meant to be relied
on for our skill.
In fact, throughout history andjust about every culture, it's
always been men who have broughtskill to the table and said, we
(10:38):
can figure out how to do this,and if we do figure out how to
do this, it's going to make ourworld and the world around us
even better.
So that's what skill is allabout.
It's not about being an expertnecessarily, and it's certainly
not about showing off how goodyou are at something or even how
much better you are at somethingthan someone else's.
(10:59):
That's kind of a modern versionof skill that's really based in
arrogance.
We're not looking for arrogance,we're looking for helpfulness.
Men need to learn the skillsthat are necessary in order for
them to be helpful to the peoplearound them in their world.
And in doing that, we show whatmanly skill is really all about.
(11:20):
Now the last two marks ofmanhood are a little bit
different because the firstthree are primarily things that
men can do on their own.
You can get better at strength,courage, and skill just by
working on them by yourself.
But the last two are inherentlyrelational, which means that to
grow in honor and allegiance,you're gonna have to do it
(11:42):
within the context ofrelationships with others.
Honor is all about yourrelationships to your peers.
It's about doing right by thoseclosest to you.
And so honor is kind of thehorizontal access of a man's
relational world.
Allegiance is about being underauthority to someone or
(12:05):
something else in your life.
So allegiance is the verticalaxis of a man's relational
world.
Now, when you put these twothings together, learning to
relate rightly to the people whoare closest to you and the
people who are in authority overyou, a man can improve
significantly at his life.
(12:26):
That's why honor and allegianceare probably the two most
important of the five marks ofmanhood.
They are really the place thatmost men can stand to grow and
to get better at being a man.
When it comes to honor, it'shelpful to realize that the
definition of honor that we areusing here as a, as one of the
five marks of manhood, it'sactually different than the way
(12:49):
that we use honor most of thetime in our culture.
It's not just something likeintegrity or esteem or ACC
claim, although it's okay to usethe word that way.
But those words assume thathonor is something positive and
it really isn't.
Honor just means that you'redoing right by the people around
you.
So if the people around you aredoing bad things and you do bad
(13:11):
things in order to get honoredby them.
It doesn't make you a good man.
So honor doesn't have to bemorally good.
It's actually kind of morallyneutral.
It depends on the way that thepeople around you are living,
and if you're living by theirvalues and their codes, you're
gonna get honored for that.
That's kind of the point.
What it means is that you needto choose the people around you
(13:35):
wisely.
What they honor is going to bethe kind of man that you become,
and so you want to choose othermen, especially who are going to
honor things that move youupwards and towards the kind of
man that you want to be.
You want the values that theyhave.
(13:55):
To be the things that are gonnaactually help you grow into
being the best version ofyourself.
And as you do that, you will behonored by the people that you
care most about.
That kind of honor is somethingthat men naturally crave.
We want the people around us topraise us, to respect us, to
hold us in high regard, and wewill do just about anything to
(14:17):
earn that kind of affection andattention.
So making sure that we aregetting it for things that are
actually.
What we want it to be about isreally important.
Choose the people who will honoryou wisely.
In the same regard, choose thepeople that you will follow
wisely.
The person or the things thatyou give your allegiance to are
(14:41):
going to shape not only yourlife, but the lives of those
around you as well.
Especially for those of you whoare husbands and fathers, your
all.
Is going to shape the life andthe culture of your family in
ways that you can't evenpredict, but far more than your
own values.
Your allegiance is actuallygoing to shape a lot of your
(15:02):
life and your world.
So learning to be able to choosethat allegiance well and to
follow well, those that are inauthority over you is an
important part of being a man.
Especially when it comes to whatwe'll call ultimate allegiance,
which is the aspect of your Godor your code, or whatever the
(15:22):
thing in your life is that holdsultimate authority over you.
Learning to be able to choosethat rightly and to follow that
God or that thing well is ofutmost importance to being a
man.
Okay.
Those are the five marks ofmanhood, strength, courage,
skill, honor, and allegiance.
(15:42):
When you put all of those thingstogether, you begin to get a
picture of what it means to be aman and how to actually do the
things that are gonna help youdemonstrate manhood to the world
around you.
If you are actively.
Working on those five traits,trying to get better In all of
(16:03):
those things, you will grow as aman.
You will become more manly.
That's just how manhood works.
If you are actively engaged atgetting better in those five
marks, you are becoming betterat being a.
It is not that hard.
Right?
And I think that's actually thekind of definition that we need
(16:23):
for manhood.
Look, 50% of the world have, youknow, managed over the course of
history to step into manhoodwithout nearly as much challenge
as we're having to face today.
So it really shouldn't be thatdifficult of a thing to figure
out what a man is and how to doit.
We need a simple definition.
And so this gives us a reallyclear and a very accessible
(16:44):
picture of what it looks like tobe a man.
Now in the book How to Be a Man,you're gonna get much more
detail about what those thingslook like.
But you're also gonna get somechallenges.
You're gonna get some thingsthat are gonna actually give you
opportunities to get better ateach one of those five marks.
So some ways to be able to kindof.
Test yourself to see how you'redoing and to actually make some
(17:07):
progress in those things.
So I want to encourage you to goright now and to get a copy of
how to be a Man.
It should be available at Amazonor anywhere that books are sold.
You can pick up an ebook.
Or a paperback copy, and eitherway it will help and challenge
you as a man.
I have written it as a book thatis accessible to men.
It is less than a hundred pages,so it is an easy read for you.
(17:30):
It's something that you're goingto enjoy.
There's no fluff.
It's just straight to the point,and it's things that are gonna
challenge you and encourage youwith a picture of a man that is
actually accessible and capablefor you of becoming.
I know that it's gonna help youget to the place where you are
becoming the kind of man thatyou really want to be.
So I hope that you'll go pick upa copy of it now.
(17:50):
And I hope also that if you'veenjoyed this content, that you
will like this video andsubscribe to the channel.
And I would love to engage withyou around this topic.
So put in the comments downbelow which of the five marks
you feel like you most need togrow in, and how do you wanna
work on that thing?
Write that down there in thecomments, and I look forward to
discussing with you and engagingwith you about the things that
(18:13):
you have to say.
And I will talk to you next timehere on the Manhood Tribes
Channel.
We'll see you then.
Men, if I ask you the question,what is it that makes you a man?
How would you answer thatquestion?
And now I'm not just talkingabout what makes you a man
physically, right?
Not body parts, but I'm talkingabout at the soul level.
What is it that makes you a man?
(00:22):
Would you have an answer to thatquestion?
And even if you did have ananswer to that question, how
confident would you be in that?
Answer that, yeah, that's theright answer.
And not only that, it's theright answer for you, but that
you think it's the right answerfor men in general.
That what it is that makes you aman is what makes other men
(00:43):
believe that they are men aswell.
Now, I know that maybe sounds alittle complicated or a little
complex, but I think actuallythat's the question that we as
men are wrestling with in ourculture today.
It has gotten really difficultto figure out what is a man in
our culture?
How do we males know that we aremen?
(01:07):
How have we lived or what havewe done that has earned the
right for us to be called men?
Is it just simply by having maleanatomy and showing up onto the
scene that we get to be calledmen?
I think most of us feelsomething intuitive in us that
tells us, ah, there's more to itthan that, but we're not
(01:29):
entirely sure what that is.
If any of that rings true foryou, I want you to know that it
rings true for most men.
It certainly has rung true forme and in my early twenties, I
was really wrestling with thesequestions very significantly.
What does it mean to be a man?
(01:50):
Am I a man?
How would I know if I am one?
How do you define what it meansto be a.
All of these questions havegotten really unclear in our
culture, and it from the time ofmy twenties to where I am now in
my forties, it's only gottenmore confusing in our world.
The whole idea of gender and ofmasculinity in particular are
(02:14):
things that have gotten veryvague, have gotten very fluid.
When it comes to masculinity,have maybe even become very
negative to even think aboutidentifying that way or
proclaiming yourself as thatsometimes looked down upon or
frowned on, or made for you tofeel something shameful because
(02:35):
that's how you think ofyourself.
All of that makes it reallydifficult for us as men to
actually figure out what does itmean to be a man and how do we
live as men in a way that feelsboth authentic and helpful to
the world around us.
My name's Don Ross, and here weare on the Manhood Tribes
(02:56):
Channel and I have some reallyexciting news, which is that I
have written a book called Howto Be a Man, and this book is
meant to help us try to answersome of those questions to
together, to be able to give ussomething of a roadmap to
figuring out what does it meanto be a man.
To give us a vision of strongand healthy masculinity and
(03:19):
point us in how to actually beable to get there.
Because I'll tell you what,guys, when I was in my twenties,
I'm wrestling significantly withthose questions.
I was having a hard time findingthe answers.
I didn't know who to turn to.
I didn't really have a model forwhat I wanted to look like as a
man, and so I wasn't sure whatdirection I needed to head in to
(03:41):
be able to actually make thathappen.
So I just started doing what Icould.
I read a bunch of books thatwere written about manhood and
masculinity.
I watched a bunch of movies thatguys really love and tried to
figure out what is, or what arethose movies saying about being
men?
And I just started talking to awhole lot of men.
(04:01):
I asked guys my age and guysolder than me, what it meant to
be a man in their minds.
And I got honestly a lot ofdifferent answers.
But I did start to see somethemes emerge.
I started to see somecommonalities, both from the
ways that guys around me talked,but also in stories and
histories, the ways that guyshad kind of always talked, the
(04:24):
things they talked about, theways they lived, the kinds of
relationships and interactionsthat they had, not only with
just the culture at large, butespecially with other men around
them, the men that they wereclose to, and why they chose to
be close to those men.
What was it about thoserelationships that helped them
be able to step into manhoodwithin their realm and feel
(04:47):
confident that they belonged asmen?
These are the things that I wasreally hungry for and that I
think our culture is hungry foras well.
And what emerged from all ofthat study and research and
question asking and conversationwas what I have now written
about in this book that I callthe Five Marks of Manhood.
(05:08):
Now, if you followed along onthis channel at all, you know
that we talk about the fivemarks of manhood regularly, but
I don't always get to go indepth into the five marks of
manhood in every episode here onthe channel.
And so that's one of the greatthings about this book is that
it gives me an opportunity todiscuss with you what these
marks of manhood really are andwhat they're all about and why
(05:29):
they present to us a picture ofmanhood that is worth following.
So let me very briefly lay outto you what those five marks of
manhood are, and then we'regonna talk a little bit more
about them so that I can giveyou some information that you'll
find.
Uh, some of it's in the book,but not all of it is.
And so I want to tease you to beable to get to a place where you
would say, yeah, I need more ofthat.
(05:53):
The five marks of manhood arestrength, courage, skill.
Honor and allegiance.
These are the traits that Ibelieve every man should possess
in order to demonstrate what itmeans to be a man.
In other words, you should havethose things within yourself so
that you can live them out in away that other people see from
(06:13):
you.
Oh, yeah, that's what it meansto be a man.
He does those things.
Strength, courage, skill, honor,and allegiance.
He does them in a way thatdemonstrates, he is a.
man Now let's take a little bitmore of a deep dive into each of
those things.
Strength.
When I'm talking about strengthas a mark of manhood, I'm
particularly talking aboutphysical strength, although I
(06:36):
know there's other forms ofstrength as well, but.
Physical strength is somethingthat is really at the core of
what it means to be a man.
Our bodies are built forstrength, and there's something
about the essence of a man thatinvolves using our bodies to be
able to do something that weonce couldn't do, to push
(06:56):
ourself to a limit and tosurpass that limit to see how we
are capable of overcomingchallenges in the world by using
our physical strength.
This is at the heart of what itmeans to be a man.
And our physical strength ismeant to be for good.
It's meant to be offered to theworld in a way that helps
others.
Men show up in the world bybeing strong and by using our
(07:20):
strength for the benefit of theworld around us.
This is the essence of whatbeing a man is all about, and
all of the other marks ofmanhood flow out of this idea of
strength.
So that's the perfect place tostart.
It's also the easiest mark ofmanhood to be able to work on.
One of the great things aboutthe marks of manhood is that we
(07:41):
can get better at all of them.
You're not stuck at the placewhere you're starting from today
in any of them, and just becauseyou might feel maybe a little
bit unmanly in a certain area,maybe particularly in the area
of strength, doesn't mean thatyou can't do anything about it.
Are you gonna be the world'sstrongest man one day?
Probably not, but that's notwhat the mark of manhood of
(08:03):
strength is all about.
It's not about being strongerthan other men.
It's about using your strengthfor the benefit of others around
you.
So you've got to be cultivatingthat strength so that you have
something to actually offer andgetting stronger.
Getting better at strength isactually not that hard for men
to do.
Like I said, our bodies arebuilt for it, and so if you can
(08:26):
push yourself just a little bit,your strength will naturally
improve.
The second mark is the mark ofcourage.
Courage isn't about having nofear.
It's about actually showing upin the face of our fears and
trying to move towards thosethings in a way that we can
overcome them.
So courage is really about aposture and a movement.
(08:50):
It's about saying I'm not goingto back down from the things
that scare me, from the thingsthat intimidate me, from the
things that feel maybeoverwhelming or too big of a
challenge.
In fact, I'm going to stand upto those things and figure out
how to move towards them.
And in doing that as a man, Istart to learn that.
(09:10):
I actually can overcome somethings that my courage is meant
to assist me in being able toaccomplish the things in life
that are really worthaccomplishing.
Whether that's actually, uh,facing up to some kind of threat
or something that's imposing orintimidating and being able to
say, Hey, no, you don't get totake advantage of me.
(09:32):
Or whether it's something morelike.
Going into a relational depthwith someone that you want to go
closer with, and realizing youdon't really know what to do
there, but you're gonna ventureinto that territory anyway.
That can feel really scary formost men to do.
But building those kinds ofclose relationships, whether
it's with a woman or whetherit's with close other male
(09:55):
friends, those things are reallyvaluable in a man's life.
So summoning the courage to beable to do that is really
important.
The third mark of manhood isskill.
Skill is really all aboutlearning to be able to do things
well.
That can be simple things like,you know, driving a car or
fixing a leaky faucet, or it canbe much more complex.
(10:17):
Things like running, learninghow to run an organization, or
how to be able to cure some kindof illness or disease.
Those things all involve skilland men are meant to be relied
on for our skill.
In fact, throughout history andjust about every culture, it's
always been men who have broughtskill to the table and said, we
(10:38):
can figure out how to do this,and if we do figure out how to
do this, it's going to make ourworld and the world around us
even better.
So that's what skill is allabout.
It's not about being an expertnecessarily, and it's certainly
not about showing off how goodyou are at something or even how
much better you are at somethingthan someone else's.
(10:59):
That's kind of a modern versionof skill that's really based in
arrogance.
We're not looking for arrogance,we're looking for helpfulness.
Men need to learn the skillsthat are necessary in order for
them to be helpful to the peoplearound them in their world.
And in doing that, we show whatmanly skill is really all about.
(11:20):
Now the last two marks ofmanhood are a little bit
different because the firstthree are primarily things that
men can do on their own.
You can get better at strength,courage, and skill just by
working on them by yourself.
But the last two are inherentlyrelational, which means that to
grow in honor and allegiance,you're gonna have to do it
(11:42):
within the context ofrelationships with others.
Honor is all about yourrelationships to your peers.
It's about doing right by thoseclosest to you.
And so honor is kind of thehorizontal access of a man's
relational world.
Allegiance is about being underauthority to someone or
(12:05):
something else in your life.
So allegiance is the verticalaxis of a man's relational
world.
Now, when you put these twothings together, learning to
relate rightly to the people whoare closest to you and the
people who are in authority overyou, a man can improve
significantly at his life.
(12:26):
That's why honor and allegianceare probably the two most
important of the five marks ofmanhood.
They are really the place thatmost men can stand to grow and
to get better at being a man.
When it comes to honor, it'shelpful to realize that the
definition of honor that we areusing here as a, as one of the
five marks of manhood, it'sactually different than the way
(12:49):
that we use honor most of thetime in our culture.
It's not just something likeintegrity or esteem or ACC
claim, although it's okay to usethe word that way.
But those words assume thathonor is something positive and
it really isn't.
Honor just means that you'redoing right by the people around
you.
So if the people around you aredoing bad things and you do bad
(13:11):
things in order to get honoredby them.
It doesn't make you a good man.
So honor doesn't have to bemorally good.
It's actually kind of morallyneutral.
It depends on the way that thepeople around you are living,
and if you're living by theirvalues and their codes, you're
gonna get honored for that.
That's kind of the point.
What it means is that you needto choose the people around you
(13:35):
wisely.
What they honor is going to bethe kind of man that you become,
and so you want to choose othermen, especially who are going to
honor things that move youupwards and towards the kind of
man that you want to be.
You want the values that theyhave.
(13:55):
To be the things that are gonnaactually help you grow into
being the best version ofyourself.
And as you do that, you will behonored by the people that you
care most about.
That kind of honor is somethingthat men naturally crave.
We want the people around us topraise us, to respect us, to
hold us in high regard, and wewill do just about anything to
(14:17):
earn that kind of affection andattention.
So making sure that we aregetting it for things that are
actually.
What we want it to be about isreally important.
Choose the people who will honoryou wisely.
In the same regard, choose thepeople that you will follow
wisely.
The person or the things thatyou give your allegiance to are
(14:41):
going to shape not only yourlife, but the lives of those
around you as well.
Especially for those of you whoare husbands and fathers, your
all.
Is going to shape the life andthe culture of your family in
ways that you can't evenpredict, but far more than your
own values.
Your allegiance is actuallygoing to shape a lot of your
(15:02):
life and your world.
So learning to be able to choosethat allegiance well and to
follow well, those that are inauthority over you is an
important part of being a man.
Especially when it comes to whatwe'll call ultimate allegiance,
which is the aspect of your Godor your code, or whatever the
(15:22):
thing in your life is that holdsultimate authority over you.
Learning to be able to choosethat rightly and to follow that
God or that thing well is ofutmost importance to being a
man.
Okay.
Those are the five marks ofmanhood, strength, courage,
skill, honor, and allegiance.
(15:42):
When you put all of those thingstogether, you begin to get a
picture of what it means to be aman and how to actually do the
things that are gonna help youdemonstrate manhood to the world
around you.
If you are actively.
Working on those five traits,trying to get better In all of
(16:03):
those things, you will grow as aman.
You will become more manly.
That's just how manhood works.
If you are actively engaged atgetting better in those five
marks, you are becoming betterat being a.
It is not that hard.
Right?
And I think that's actually thekind of definition that we need
(16:23):
for manhood.
Look, 50% of the world have, youknow, managed over the course of
history to step into manhoodwithout nearly as much challenge
as we're having to face today.
So it really shouldn't be thatdifficult of a thing to figure
out what a man is and how to doit.
We need a simple definition.
And so this gives us a reallyclear and a very accessible
(16:44):
picture of what it looks like tobe a man.
Now in the book How to Be a Man,you're gonna get much more
detail about what those thingslook like.
But you're also gonna get somechallenges.
You're gonna get some thingsthat are gonna actually give you
opportunities to get better ateach one of those five marks.
So some ways to be able to kindof.
Test yourself to see how you'redoing and to actually make some
(17:07):
progress in those things.
So I want to encourage you to goright now and to get a copy of
how to be a Man.
It should be available at Amazonor anywhere that books are sold.
You can pick up an ebook.
Or a paperback copy, and eitherway it will help and challenge
you as a man.
I have written it as a book thatis accessible to men.
It is less than a hundred pages,so it is an easy read for you.
(17:30):
It's something that you're goingto enjoy.
There's no fluff.
It's just straight to the point,and it's things that are gonna
challenge you and encourage youwith a picture of a man that is
actually accessible and capablefor you of becoming.
I know that it's gonna help youget to the place where you are
becoming the kind of man thatyou really want to be.
So I hope that you'll go pick upa copy of it now.
(17:50):
And I hope also that if you'veenjoyed this content, that you
will like this video andsubscribe to the channel.
And I would love to engage withyou around this topic.
So put in the comments downbelow which of the five marks
you feel like you most need togrow in, and how do you wanna
work on that thing?
Write that down there in thecomments, and I look forward to
discussing with you and engagingwith you about the things that
(18:13):
you have to say.
And I will talk to you next timehere on the Manhood Tribes
Channel.
We'll see you then.
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